Beast Mastery Artifact Traits and Relics

This section of the Beast Mastery guide covers everything about the artifact weapon Titanstrike, including traits and relics. This guide is written by Bendak from Eyes of the Beast and the Hunting Party Podcast. Updated for the latest patch.

Recommended Titanstrike Build Path

Beast Mastery needs to unlock its first 3 golden traits to reach its maximum potential, so you'll want to take the quickest path possible to that goal. It's as simple as going around the artifact tree in a clockwise motion, taking the shortest possible path to the golden traits. After that things get a bit more back and forth with the new patch 7.2 traits.

Choosing the right Relics

Some Beast Mastery traits can be worth more than ilevel upgrades to Titanstrike, so it's not always as simple as equipping your highest ilevel relics. The easiest way to value and compare a particular relic is to assign a Titanstrike ilevel value to each trait that can be on a relic. The following values were obtained by simulating all of the traits in tier 20 gear.

Just like before, you generally want to stick with Kill Command traits whenever possible. In Tomb of Sargeras, there are Donnerkiefer and Schlängelnde Schlangen Storm and Arcane relics (see the Gear section) which are good for single target, but there isn't an Iron relic with a good single target trait, so you may have to search outside of Tomb of Sargeras for one of those -- Nighthold has a couple (from Skorpyron and Gul'dan) as well as Mythic+ Vault of the Wardens.

There can be slight variations based on what legendaries you have equipped. For example, without the legendary belt, Slithering Serpents can be 1 or 2 ilvl higher. When using the legendary bracers, Wilderness Expert can also go up a point. If you have difficult decisions to make with these traits, I would suggest simming the differences when you can. This is getting very nitpicky though. The above chart can be relied on for most decisions.

If you are using the Aspekt des Wildtiers talent, both Cobra Shot traits go up in relative value and the Kill Command traits go down in value.

Furious Swipes Value

Wütende Stöße is trickier to put a number on since it only has value in pure AoE situations, but it is extremely valuable in those situations. For example, in sustained 4-target AoE this trait is worth about +25 Titanstrike ilevel. The downside is you give up some single target damage in the process, which is generally more desirable. However, if you spend a good deal of your time clearing dungeons it can be worthwhile to have Wütende Stöße on one of your relics.

Traits To Avoid

These traits are worth no DPS and an ilevel upgrade will always take precedence. The only time you should use a relic with one of these traits is if it's a significant ilevel upgrade (reference the table above) to outshine your current DPS trait.

Titanendonner: A single target DPS cooldown (1 minute) that causes all of your active pets (including Alphatiers) to discharge electricity into their target for 8 seconds. It's always best to stack this with Zorn des Wildtiers when possible. Also make sure you cast it immediately after casting Alphatier to get its full benefit.

Kobrakommandant: Your Cobra Shot has a 10% chance to summon 2-4 snakes. These snakes melee attack your target for a trivial amount of damage, but they also apply Todesstoßgift. This trait is a small boost to single target DPS.

Donnerhieb: During Aspekt der Wildnis, your primary pet and Hati deal additional Nature damage with each melee attack. This bonus damage is dealt to all enemies in an 8-yard cone in front of the pets. This makes Aspect of the Wild a more potent cooldown than it was before.

Schlängelnde Schlangen: Each point decreases the Focus cost of Cobra Shot by 2. This is a lot nicer than it looks on paper -- it improves the rotation noticeably.